“We all shower together,” Nick Kyrgios makes a startling revelation about the ATP Tour’s locker rooms

The Australian mercurial discloses the reality of how close the players actually are with rivalries and comparisons not bothering them.

“We all shower together,” Nick Kyrgios makes a startling revelation about the ATP Tour’s locker rooms

Nick Kyrgios (image via: Imago)

Former Australian Open Men’s Doubles winner Nick Kyrgios continues to work his way through his injury. His injury at the end of 2022 forced him to miss the first half of the 2023 season. He hoped to return for the Grass season and made his season debut in Stuttgart.

He however failed to win the match and to make matters worse, picked up another injury. The Aussie was eventually ruled out for the season and is yet to play in 2024 as well. Fans and even he hoped to be ready for the home leg of 2024 but his recovery wasn’t up to the mark and had to sit out.

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He is however not far away from the courts. He had a short stint with Tennis Channel before turning commentator for Eurosport for this year’s Australian Open. Currently, he is hosting his new show ‘ Good Trouble with Nick Kyrgios’ where he gets candid with his guests.

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His first guest was celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay. The two indulged in a long conversation speaking on various topics. During this, the former World No. 13 opened up on how tennis despite being an individual sport still carries the ‘team vibe’. 

The thing about tennis is everyone thinks it’s individual, but then we shower all together, we eat together, so we see these people minutes before we walk out into the arena, which is the craziest thing in sport. Usually, you have separate locker rooms and you don’t see this person all day, you are trying to kill this person.
said Kyrgios. 
So for instance at last year’s US Open me and [Daniil] Medvedev are about to go out there and we’re just in the locker room watching the previous match finish and we are getting our stuff together and we go to play. Then we just come right back into the locker room, get undressed, shower, and then we are the only two people in the locker room, and I have to see this person all day.
added the Aussie.

Nick Kyrgios believes Tennis’ team environment makes it difficult to get an edge on players

Kyrgios further went on to explain why this environment makes things complicated in rivalries. With players spending a lot of time together, there develops a camaraderie between them. The Aussie is a big basketball fan but finds tennis ‘crazy’ due to the imbalance between individualism and team spirit.

Nick Kyrgios and Stefanos Tsitsipas
Nick Kyrgios, Thanasi Kokkiankis, and Stefanos Tsitsipas (Via Instagram)
So it’s not like a team environment but it feels like you’re doing the same thing because it’s like ‘I’ve just played in front of millions of people against this guy for hundreds and thousands of dollars, and now I have to shower next to him’.
commented Kyrgios. 
I’ve always been a team environment guy. I love basketball, soccer, all that type of stuff. But tennis is so crazy like that, it’s hard to get an edge. We spend hours and hours together. I was talking to his [Medvedev’s] coach before we walked out there [at the US Open]
concluded the former World No. 13.

Kyrgios is currently ranked 470th in the world due to his long absence. He is yet to confirm when he will be back. Since 2016, he has played only 16 matches on clay and it looks unlikely he will make an injury comeback on the surface he dislikes the most.

However, he had promised to take his girlfriend Costeen Hatzi to Paris and for that, he was ready to play at the French Open. However, given the current circumstances, it is difficult to make any prediction about his participation in this year’s Roland Garros.

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